Gracefully Gone
by LesserKnown
Summary: Remus' thoughts about Sirius during the end of OotP. Spoilers for that. OneShot.


He was always so graceful. Kind of an easy coolness - a flip of his hair, a crooked smile, an arched eyebrow. Something that someone like me could never hope to emulate.

Since his return, his redemption, we've spent most of our time sitting in front of the fire. Staring into the embers, talking in floods and in spurts. Even with his eyes hollowed out by Azkaban, his teeth rotted and his hair matted by the horrors he has endured, he has that casual elegance that I've always admired.

When I wasn't tramping all over the country on errands for the Order, running my shoes bare and my cloak ragged, I haunted 12 Grimmauld Place. Sirius thought that I was baby-sitting him, keeping his spirits up in his 'captivity'. In reality, he was the one who was holding me together. For twelve years I thought I was the only one left. The Marauders, my plucky band of friends, had been decimated by the war - one murdered, on turned, and one lost.

But then, miracle of miracles, Sirius was returned to me. Peter was still lost, now outed as a traitor, but I had Padfoot back. Some measure of my spirit was renewed.

The nightmares kept him awake at odd hours, the inactivity drove him to manic fits - but he was alive. He was keeping me from total despair.

The life of a werewolf is not one I would choose to live. If I had known, if I had been given some measure of all that I would endure - it would have been better that the wolf that bit me had ripped out my throat and finished the job.

Sirius hated talk like that. He'd been the first to call me Moony - he had been the first to rip through the horror that engulfed me each month and find the humanity. The possibilities.

Granted, most of those possibilities involved sneaking about under an invisibility cloak, desperately trying to avoid Filtch's cat. But he'd gracefully sidestepped the angst and gloom that had surrounded me and helped me find...myself.

I became the man I was today because James and Peter and Sirius...because they were my friends. Because they saw me as a man who occasionally became a monster, instead of a monster cloaked as a man.

To be a werewolf meant I was ostracized. Couldn't find a job, couldn't afford a decent place to live, always living like I was hunted. Ratty clothes, empty stomach, looks of disgust from wizards I passed on the street. No one wants to be friends with someone who would consider them a viable meal option once a month.

It was sick and wrong, but I was almost happy that Voldemort was out in the open again. Gave me a purpose, people to be around. Life was easier without so many annoying shades of gray.

Sirius had come back for Harry - who had been the topic of many of our late night conversations. Harry, who had inherited James' smile and Lily's eyes, and all of our thirst for something more. He was ours and no one felt that responsibility more than Sirius.

I was to take care of him, if the worst should happen. The worst.

I dreamed of death. Many times I even longed for it. The worst was to live on the cusp of humanity - close enough to see, but separated by something that won't ever change. But Sirius would laugh at my maudlin, arch one eyebrow in amusement. I was the old man with my worries and my scars and my aches and pains. Sirius would lope through the house, talk of high dreams and life beyond this war.

A house with Harry. A family. I would, of course, be the doting uncle. And a girl, maybe, a wife. Love and kids and the white picket fence. Such things were what occupied his mind as he sat alone staring at the fire. When he wasn't caught in the darkness of Azkaban, when his hopes flew above the dementor's grasp.

So he let me soar with him, sometimes. He flew gracefully along on his wishes and dreams whilst I flopped beside him, stumbling on reality.

And now here we were. Harry had been in danger. Sirius had twirled his wand, lifted his head and sniffed the impending battle. And he wasn't afraid. Not of death, not of pain - only of Harry's suffering. While he could hold a wand and shout spells Harry would be safe. So sure, he was. So certain of his own casual grace under pressure.

He had always been graceful. I don't know why it surprised me that he was so, even now. Arching gracefully back, through the air. Breezing through the archway, the tattered drapes fluttering slightly.

Gone.

Harry was screaming as though his heart would break. Screaming Sirius' name. I held the boy back, my arms encircling him, protecting him. But my eyes never left the dais. Never left his grave.

He wasn't coming back. He wasn't coming back because he was...

My heart wasn't broken. It was gone. A sucking hollow spot was left where my soul should be.

And I was alone. Again.

* * *

**Disclaimer:** Situations and characters all belong to J.K. Rowling. Sometimes they inspire me.

**A/N:** Remus Lupin is, as you may be able to tell, my favorite character - certainly in the Potter-verse and perhaps in most of literature. This is my idea of a glimpse inside his world. Let me know what you think.


End file.
